Genentech Inc Fill and Finish Facility, Hillsboro, Oregon, USA

Genentech is one of the leading biotechnology corporations in the US, founded in 1976 with its HQ in San Francisco Bay in South San Francisco, California. The company is regarded by many as one of the pioneers of the biotech industry. Genentech now has facilities all around the world and employs more than 10,000 personnel.

The new Hillsboro facility

In 2006 Genentech obtained a new 75-acre site just 20 miles west of Portland in Hillsboro, Oregon. The intention was the construction of a new state-of-the-art $250m fill and finish facility, to occupy 25 acres, for the production of some of the newer drugs in the development pipeline.

The three-storey, 296,000ft² Hillsboro fill/finish facility (HFF) is expected to start its operations in September 2009. Currently, validation testing for packaging lines is being done at the HFF facility. This is necessary to obtain the US FDA approval to begin receiving bulk shipments of Genentech's drugs produced in the South San Francisco facility, and then proceeding with the final processing and packaging of these drugs.

These drugs are a part of the product line that Roche bought in March 2009 when it acquired Genentech. The drugs include recombinant growth hormone Nutropin, non-Hodgkin's Lymphoma treatment Rituxan, and cancer drugs Avastin and Herceptin.

The Hillsboro facility has five buildings – the main administrative offices, the GMP-manufacturing building, a utility building, a GMP warehouse and a distribution centre, all occupying 12.5 acres of the 75-acre site.

Formal planning of the HFF project began in 2006 and the facility broke ground in December 2006. There are expected to be 200–250 employees initially at the plant and 300 employees by 2015.

The manufacturing facility is designed to produce 20 million vials of drugs per annum in sizes 3cc to 100cc. It is also expected to help minimise on-site inventory space by cutting manufacturing costs.

The just-in-time facility consists of two freezer dryers, with space for two additional freeze dryers in case of production contingencies.

The HFF also has two filling and packaging lines – one liquid, the other either liquid or 'lab-like' products. It also has shell space for a third filling line that is expected to be a syringe fill line.

The existing fill and finish facility is in California and is being relocated. The fill and finish facility will receive bulk frozen product shipped from other Genentech plants in California, at Vacaville and Oceanside, which will then be thawed, prepared with the addition of diluents or buffers, and filled into sterile vials or syringes before being packed and shipped.

Incentives

The company received a number of incentives for building the plant in Oregon on a state and county level. Washington County waived millions in property taxes by negotiating a 15-year tax incentive agreement under the state's Strategic Investment Program.

Under this special deal, Genentech agreed to pay the full property taxes on the first $25m of investment in land, building and equipment, but then anything up to a maximum of $250m will be exempt from taxation.

Genentech also will pay an annual community service fee of $500,000, as well as an additional fee for each year of the 15-year agreement.

The state of Oregon agreed to invest around $5m for worker training and infrastructure improvements. The Governor's Strategic Reserve Fund provided $2m and this made the total state investment in the project $4.8m.

Contractors

Group Mackenzie has provided site development services as part of the design build team for the new facility. Initially, Group Mackenzie prepared alternative conceptual site plans for the 12-acre Phase 1 project.

Later in the project Group Mackenzie, in collaboration with Flad and Associates, prepared the final site plans and engineering plans and obtained approval from the city to build. Group Mackenzie provided civil engineering, landscape architecture design and construction documents for the project.

Genentech acquisition

In March 2009, Genentech was acquired by the Swiss pharmaceutical company Hoffmann La Roche for $46.8bn. The combined entity is now the seventh-largest US pharmaceuticals company in terms of market share.

Genentech has many products to its credit in most spheres of treatment, including Activase/Cathflo, Nutropin, Pulmozyme, Rituxan, Herceptin, TNKase, Xolair, Raptiva, Avastin, Tarceva and Lucentis. Many of the products treat cancer, arthritis or asthma and others promote tissue growth and repair for patients suffering from heart, lung or other ailments.